Dell Mini 10 with New Atom and Linux Option

PC maker Dell has announced the Inspiron Mini 10 netbook that runs on the new Intel Atom CPU.

The Mini 10 should start appearing on the U.S. market the beginning of January 2010, just in time for the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. Intel had announced the Atom platform that runs the new Mini 10 just days ago and promised to put it in devices by January. Dell could then be one of numerous vendors integrating the smaller and energy-saving Atom package on a timely basis.

The basic Inspiron Mini 10 model costs about $300. With it comes the Atom N450 processor with 1.66 GHz, a 10.1" display (at 1024 x 600 pixels), a scant 1 GByte DDR2 RAM, a three-cell battery and a 160-GByte hard disk drive. Dell also offers a few extended configurations, such as those with a Broadcom Crystal HD media accelerator, HDTV tuner, GPS, mobile broadband modem and the like. Dell promises the extended options in the "coming weeks" or, in the case of the Broadcom HD chip, in Q1 2010.

As is now usual, the vendor is playing up to the Windows 7 launch. An Ubuntu version should start appearing, again, "in the coming weeks." The oft used phrase also applies to the worldwide market release. Selected configurations are promised for the international market.